Niagara Falls- Monday
Jul. 25th, 2022 09:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fates_jayeJaye arranged a meeting with Katrina and Father Scofield at the Barrel, happily bringing her back to him. Or Him. And- fingers crossed- maybe getting herself an exorcism in the process? And while Father Scofield looked not pleased about it, Katrina was happy as happy can be, even insisting, "Father, it's God's work."
"No, it's this woman's work," he replied, nodding to Jaye, noy happy.
"Yes!" Katrina agreed, not getting it. "Yes! God has kept you here- He brought us here to perform his work for Jaye."
He eyed Jaye. "Is that so?" he asked, and continued, "Katrina’s been living in a nunnery these past twelve years. Please keep in mind I have not."
"What?" Jaye asked. "Her faith is back and possibly better than ever. You should be thanking me."
"And what is it you’re hoping to get from us- by way of thanks?" Father Scofield asked, suspicious.
"Well," Jaye hedged, "since you mention it, there is one little thing."
"What little thing?"
"Just a little matter of an exorcism?"
The reaction of "An exorcism?!" startled several patrons.
Jaye looked around, embarrassed. "Shhh! I have to drink in here!"
"Are you out of your mind?"
"I’m willing to try anything," Jaye said, realizing that she felt a little desperate about it now that the opportunity was actually presented to her. She'd resigned herself a long time ago to dealing with this thing of hers, but she'd also really rather not deal with it. "I mean, she’s willing to try anything. To help me. Which does help her with that one issue. It’s a big circle of help."
"She’s afflicted," Katrina explained. "Demons live inside her. They talk to her and tell her to do things. She needs our help to purge them."
"Sadly, it’s all true," Jaye said, maybe too sincere.
Father Scofield all but exploded at that. "I don’t know what you’re really after here, but I do not do exorcisms. They’re violent and dangerous and… well, stupid."
"Hey, Father. Come on. Let’s not discourage her," Jaye pleaded. "She’s eager to do God’s work. Please. I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in months." Years, really.
"Do this with me, Father, and I will willingly and joyously return to the convent with you," Katrina said, and jumped on his pause. "God works in mysterious ways, you know that. Isn’t it possible that the reason God has never spoken to me is because He needed me to run away, because He needed me to end up here because He needed me to cast out demons from this poor girl’s soul?"
"Amen, sister!" Jaye said.
Father Scofield half-glared at Jaye. "Can you give us a minute?"
She nodded, reluctant, and headed to the bar to hang out by Eric. She was definitely more interested in watching Father Scofield and Katrina, though, barely noticing how Eric thunked a drink next to her pretty loudly.
"I thought the priest was leaving town?" he said, his tone clipped.
"I asked him not to," she said. "Can you hear what he’s saying to her?"
"I thought we were on the same page with this thing."
She heard the tone and looked back at him, surprised he looked pissed. She'd never seen him pissed before. "Why would you do this?" he demanded. "Why would you ambush her with the one person she doesn’t want to see? I thought you were on my side."
"I didn’t ambush her," Jaye protested. "I’m doing a good thing here. Remember how much you like me when I do good things? She loves the nunnery. She told me she was really happy there."
"Was. Was. Past tense. Things change. People change," Eric insisted. "And when other people try to force people not to change then the changing, which wasn’t easy to begin with, just gets harder."
Jaye felt something brush her shoulder, and she looked to see Katrina in the middle of storming out. She stopped at the door, looking back to Jaye to say, "I was wrong. You’re not hearing the devil. You are the devil."
Turned out Jaye didn't like Eric's "I told you so" look.
So this was going spectacularly, and Jaye found she didn't really want to be around here either right now. She wouldn't be able to get Katrina back now, Eric was mad, Father Scofield was going to be a mean priest about it, and she was probably going to get tortured by animals for a while because she couldn't make this work. She stalked out too, and got as far as her car before she stopped and called, "Just so we’re clear? Calling a girl the devil in front of the boy she likes? Not the best way to keep a friend."
"You’re not my friend," Katrina shot back, turning on her. "You’re a liar. So’s the devil. And I’m not friends with the devil. Or with Liars. Devil."
Jaye angrily yanked her door open. "I am not a liar! Not in this instance anyway!"
"You bet Father Scofield you could restore my faith in twenty-four hours- and then you pretended to be my friend!"
"I didn’t pretend to be your friend. I was forced to be your friend. Those are two very different things," Jaye retorted.
"Are you Pentecostal? Are you trying to scare God into my dirty, sinful, hellbound, unsaved heart?" Katrina demanded. "You’re horrible. You make up this story about demons talking to you through plastic animals when nothing talks to you just like nothing talks to me."
"I didn’t make anything up," Jaye told her.
Katrina let out a grunt of frustration and started to go, right in time for the Wax Lion on the dashboard to say, "Break the tail light."
"Ha! See?" Jaye said, before she could stop herself. She reached into the car to pick up the lion. "It just talked to me."
"Oh for God’s sake," Katrina sighed.
"Maybe! Maybe it is for God’s sake!"
"Break the tail light."
"Except it’s telling me to break a tail light," Jaye realized. "Which is vandalism. Which is the Devil’s work. Which is why one little exorcism is not too much to ask."
"Is this fun for you?" Katrina asked. "Torturing a wayward nun?"
"Oh, yeah, this is a laugh-riot. This is where I would most like to be- standing in the freezing cold being called a liar by a nun and coerced by a Wax Lion to commit crime. It’s so much fun!" Jaye said, slamming her car door as punctuation.
The motion made the car roll forward just a little bit, smacking into the car in front of it… breaking its tail light.
"Great," Jaye sighed.
Katrina was staring at the damage. "What just happened?"
"You little bastard!" Jaye yelled at the lion. "I can’t afford my insurance premiums as it is!"
"Your car. It broke the tail light!" Katrina said, stunned.
"I know. But I don’t think anyone else saw. So, since you and the Priest aren’t gonna help me, the least you can do is not tell anyone," Jaye said, getting in her car and driving away as quickly and innocently as possible, setting the stupid lion back on her stupid dashboard.
*****
Jaye stopped home just long enough to grab some stuff, and headed back to her parents' house, bag over her shoulder and a pillow under her arm.
"There you are, sweetheart," Darren greeted her. "Did your brother find you?"
"No, but he’ll find me when he comes home. I’m sleeping here tonight. Or trying to, anyway. You didn’t redecorate my room with zoo-themed wallpaper, did y-" And then it clicked. "Why are you all dressed up?"
"We’re going to church," Sharon said, not sounding thrilled about it.
"Is it Christmas?" It could be! Time was different between here and Fandom! It was winter months! "Because if it is it snuck up on me and nobody’s getting anything."
"It doesn’t have to be Christmas for the Tylers to go to church," Darren answered.
"Is it Easter? Is it even Sunday?"
"Your mother and I are tickled to death that you’ve turned to the Lord for guidance, sweetheart," he said. "We just think it should be our Lord."
This day was just great. "Is this an intervention?" Jaye asked. "Because you know I’m too poor to buy illicit substances."
"Sometimes, if used incorrectly, God can be an illicit substance," Karen said wisely. "Catholics aren’t bad people. They just do things differently. Their prayers have to go through saints, and apostles and statues."
"Presbyterian prayers go straight to the source, good ol’ J.C.," Darren agreed.
Sharon shrugged. "Maybe Jaye should take her 8th grade Confirmation classes again. There were so many she missed the first go around."
Jaye shot Sharon a Look. "I didn’t do anything wrong. I shouldn’t have to go to church."
"That argument has never worked for you, sweetheart. It’s never worked for any of us," Darren insisted. "Now put the pillow in your room and let’s go worship."
"Fine," Jaye sighed, grabbing her pillow and stomping off… to the front door. Then out the front door. Then to her car. Which she started. Which she drove back to the trailer.
At least here things were normal. Sure, "normal" meant a bunch of animals no one else could hear were going to sing at her all night, but at least she didn't have to hear anything about religion anymore. She was just going to get in pajamas, maybe do something pointless on the internet, and-
"Oh good god!"
She had not been expecting Katrina to be sitting on her bed, among the animals, when she turned on the light.
"I’m sorry I called you a liar," Katrina told her. "You’re not a liar, Jaye. You’re a child of God."
This day was a roller coaster. "I am? You believe in God now? I brought you back to Him? Big H?"
"You most certainly did," Katrina said, getting up to walk over to her.
And then a second later Katrina was grabbing her in some kind of weird wrestling hold and covering her mouth with a washcloth. Jaye struggled, but for a little woman this grip was strong, and hey, what did chloroform smell like…?
When Jaye came to, she was on her bed, surrounded by more candles than she owned set up all around her. She tried to move, but her arms and legs were tied to the bed with rope in a decidedly not fun way.
"Don’t you worry, Jaye," Katrina said, pulling on a pair of leather gloves. "I know what I’m doing. Aaron told me how these work. If we have to, we’ll cut the Devil out of you."
Jaye barely had time to think about how much she was going to kill her brother, because Katrina was already sprinkling holy water on her with one hand while holding notes with another. "I exorcise thee, every unclean spirit, in the name of God the Father Almighty-"
"Katrina, untie me. Untie me now!" Jaye cried.
"I can’t. You’ll be flailing soon," Katrina said, matter-of-fact.
She'd wanted this so badly earlier and now nope, nope, didn't want it, take it back. "I don’t want to flail. I don’t want you to do whatever it is you’re going to do to make me flail."
"That’s the demon talking. Jaye wanted this," Katrina reminded herself, and then leaned to shout into Jaye's face. "Jaye, can you hear me?! Be strong, Jaye! Be strong! It’ll be gone soon!"
"Jaye doesn’t want this!" Jaye shouted back. "I don’t want this! I changed my mind!"
"Out, demon!" Katrina said, flicking more holy water on her. "Tu autem effugare, diabole!"
Jaye yelled for help, and Katrina stopped to shove a towel into her mouth to muffle the sound. She then put down the holy water to trade it for a bottle of baby oil, referencing her notes before putting it on her fingers, dabbing it on Jaye's forehead, shoulders and chest in the shape of the cross. "I anoint thee with the oil of salvation, that thou mayest have life everlasting."
After a moment of struggling, Jaye spit the towel out. "I should’ve listened to my mother. She told me you people were crazy."
"Do you believe in the Holy Spirit?" Katrina asked, picking up a knife.
Oh. Oh no. "What are you gonna do with that knife?" Jaye asked in a very small voice.
"Do you believe in the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of Saints, and the remission of sins? Do you believe in the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting?"
"No! Yes!" Jaye answered, panicked. "Can you repeat the second part?"
Katrina raised the knife. "Heavenly Father, guide my hand. Help me please you. Show yourself to me."
"The Holy water was working! More holy water!" Jaye cried. "Please! I could feel the demon leaving. No knife! More holy water."
Katrina actually looked relieved to be able to set the knife down and pick up the holy water again to throw more on her. "Keep fighting, Jaye! I’m here for you!"
This chick was just crazy with the holy water. Jaye kept having to turn her face to avoid getting shot in the eye with it as Katrina prayed, part in English and part in Latin and all in crazy, and Jaye was trying to figure out what happened once she ran out of holy water.
And then Katrina picked up the knife again.
"The demon’s gone, Katrina. It worked, you did it, it’s gone!" Jaye said.
"You’re lying. The demon is lying," Katrina said, but she did seem to be really nervous. "Please, Lord, give me strength. Talk to me. Tell me what to do."
"Here’s what to do! Put down the knife," Jaye begged. "Untie me and put down the knife."
"No. It’s the Devil inside you. And God wants me to get rid of it. And you...you wanted this," Katrina pointed out. "You asked for it."
"No I didn’t! Okay, I did," she conceded. "But I didn’t know it would be like this! Please. The voices, the animals, I was just mad at them. But they aren’t demonic, it just feels that way sometimes when they’re making me help people. Katrina, please, Please! Look at what you’re doing!"
At that, Katrina blinked, and looked at the knife in her hand, and Jaye, tied up and half-soaked… "I'm just trying to get God's attention."
Jaye was ready to argue, but there was a loud bang at the door, followed by another, and Katrina had lifted the knife again.
"Jaye Tyler? Open up. Police," came the voice at the door.
Katrina clamped a hand over Jaye's mouth before she could scream.
"We have a security video of your vehicle leaving the scene of an accident earlier today." The cop paused. "Miss Tyler, we know you’re home. We can see you."
Oh thank god. Jaye chomped down on Katrina's hand. Katrina screamed, just in time for the police to bust down the door, guns drawn. "Drop your weapon!"
Katrina did, and realized this had to be a shock for them. "It's not what it looks like."
*****
And so Jaye was finishing her night up at the police station. Not the first time she'd been here, probably wouldn't be the last. She had to give a statement, then waited on an uncomfortable bench while she waited for Katrina to finish telling her story to a cop. Mostly she was bored and wanted to go home, but she didn't want to deal with animals or getting changing holy watered bedding, and she couldn't go to her parents', so maybe she called Mahandra after this.
She was distracted from that line of thought by Father Scofield coming out of one of the other rooms, looking shaken. Jaye bounced to her feet and said, "Oh my god, they called you?"
"Excuse me?" he asked, distracted.
"I thought for sure you’d left town already."
"I was…"
"Well don’t worry. I’m not pressing charges," Jaye assured him. "She was just confused. Plus I did kinda encourage her to do it. You were right, by the way. Exorcism? A very, very bad idea."
He blinked at her. "I have a child I didn’t know about."
Jaye blinked back. "Come again?"
They released Katrina from statement-giving, and she looked completely ashamed when she joined them. "Father? I'm so sorry. I should have listened to you."
Father Scofield still looked completely shell-shocked. "It's a girl."
Katrina frowned. "Huh?"
"He’s got a kid he didn’t know about," Jaye said, like it was old news and not something she'd just learned like a second ago.
"But... how?"
"In the usual way.I wasn’t always a priest," Father Scofield explained. "My life before was... there was a woman… But I had no idea... she was on the pill. I guess she’s been looking for me all this time... they pulled me over for a broken tail light… when they ran my name… I’m a dead-beat dad."
Katrina took that in, and slowly glanced towards Jaye. "Broken tail light?"
He didn't answer, looking past them. Jaye turned and saw a woman in her thirties or so coming out of the restroom, still holding the door open as he breathed, "Marta…" and went to meet her.
Jaye could only hear part of the conversation, and believe her, she was trying. It was awkward, and she heard the word "sorry" a lot, and there was a little shock from Marta about the collar. And then from the open door came a little girl, a spitting-image of Marta, who wrapped a little arm around her leg. Father Scofield knelt in front of her, talked to her a little.
For as cynical as Jaye was, she actually felt pretty good watching this. It was a terrible day, she had a lot of stuff to fix… but this was good. "Bring her back to him," she said. "Wow."
Next to her, Katrina whispered, "It's a miracle."
[NFB, NFI, uhhh content warning for attempted exorcism? Taken from Wonderfalls 1x03, Wound-up Penguin.]
"No, it's this woman's work," he replied, nodding to Jaye, noy happy.
"Yes!" Katrina agreed, not getting it. "Yes! God has kept you here- He brought us here to perform his work for Jaye."
He eyed Jaye. "Is that so?" he asked, and continued, "Katrina’s been living in a nunnery these past twelve years. Please keep in mind I have not."
"What?" Jaye asked. "Her faith is back and possibly better than ever. You should be thanking me."
"And what is it you’re hoping to get from us- by way of thanks?" Father Scofield asked, suspicious.
"Well," Jaye hedged, "since you mention it, there is one little thing."
"What little thing?"
"Just a little matter of an exorcism?"
The reaction of "An exorcism?!" startled several patrons.
Jaye looked around, embarrassed. "Shhh! I have to drink in here!"
"Are you out of your mind?"
"I’m willing to try anything," Jaye said, realizing that she felt a little desperate about it now that the opportunity was actually presented to her. She'd resigned herself a long time ago to dealing with this thing of hers, but she'd also really rather not deal with it. "I mean, she’s willing to try anything. To help me. Which does help her with that one issue. It’s a big circle of help."
"She’s afflicted," Katrina explained. "Demons live inside her. They talk to her and tell her to do things. She needs our help to purge them."
"Sadly, it’s all true," Jaye said, maybe too sincere.
Father Scofield all but exploded at that. "I don’t know what you’re really after here, but I do not do exorcisms. They’re violent and dangerous and… well, stupid."
"Hey, Father. Come on. Let’s not discourage her," Jaye pleaded. "She’s eager to do God’s work. Please. I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in months." Years, really.
"Do this with me, Father, and I will willingly and joyously return to the convent with you," Katrina said, and jumped on his pause. "God works in mysterious ways, you know that. Isn’t it possible that the reason God has never spoken to me is because He needed me to run away, because He needed me to end up here because He needed me to cast out demons from this poor girl’s soul?"
"Amen, sister!" Jaye said.
Father Scofield half-glared at Jaye. "Can you give us a minute?"
She nodded, reluctant, and headed to the bar to hang out by Eric. She was definitely more interested in watching Father Scofield and Katrina, though, barely noticing how Eric thunked a drink next to her pretty loudly.
"I thought the priest was leaving town?" he said, his tone clipped.
"I asked him not to," she said. "Can you hear what he’s saying to her?"
"I thought we were on the same page with this thing."
She heard the tone and looked back at him, surprised he looked pissed. She'd never seen him pissed before. "Why would you do this?" he demanded. "Why would you ambush her with the one person she doesn’t want to see? I thought you were on my side."
"I didn’t ambush her," Jaye protested. "I’m doing a good thing here. Remember how much you like me when I do good things? She loves the nunnery. She told me she was really happy there."
"Was. Was. Past tense. Things change. People change," Eric insisted. "And when other people try to force people not to change then the changing, which wasn’t easy to begin with, just gets harder."
Jaye felt something brush her shoulder, and she looked to see Katrina in the middle of storming out. She stopped at the door, looking back to Jaye to say, "I was wrong. You’re not hearing the devil. You are the devil."
Turned out Jaye didn't like Eric's "I told you so" look.
So this was going spectacularly, and Jaye found she didn't really want to be around here either right now. She wouldn't be able to get Katrina back now, Eric was mad, Father Scofield was going to be a mean priest about it, and she was probably going to get tortured by animals for a while because she couldn't make this work. She stalked out too, and got as far as her car before she stopped and called, "Just so we’re clear? Calling a girl the devil in front of the boy she likes? Not the best way to keep a friend."
"You’re not my friend," Katrina shot back, turning on her. "You’re a liar. So’s the devil. And I’m not friends with the devil. Or with Liars. Devil."
Jaye angrily yanked her door open. "I am not a liar! Not in this instance anyway!"
"You bet Father Scofield you could restore my faith in twenty-four hours- and then you pretended to be my friend!"
"I didn’t pretend to be your friend. I was forced to be your friend. Those are two very different things," Jaye retorted.
"Are you Pentecostal? Are you trying to scare God into my dirty, sinful, hellbound, unsaved heart?" Katrina demanded. "You’re horrible. You make up this story about demons talking to you through plastic animals when nothing talks to you just like nothing talks to me."
"I didn’t make anything up," Jaye told her.
Katrina let out a grunt of frustration and started to go, right in time for the Wax Lion on the dashboard to say, "Break the tail light."
"Ha! See?" Jaye said, before she could stop herself. She reached into the car to pick up the lion. "It just talked to me."
"Oh for God’s sake," Katrina sighed.
"Maybe! Maybe it is for God’s sake!"
"Break the tail light."
"Except it’s telling me to break a tail light," Jaye realized. "Which is vandalism. Which is the Devil’s work. Which is why one little exorcism is not too much to ask."
"Is this fun for you?" Katrina asked. "Torturing a wayward nun?"
"Oh, yeah, this is a laugh-riot. This is where I would most like to be- standing in the freezing cold being called a liar by a nun and coerced by a Wax Lion to commit crime. It’s so much fun!" Jaye said, slamming her car door as punctuation.
The motion made the car roll forward just a little bit, smacking into the car in front of it… breaking its tail light.
"Great," Jaye sighed.
Katrina was staring at the damage. "What just happened?"
"You little bastard!" Jaye yelled at the lion. "I can’t afford my insurance premiums as it is!"
"Your car. It broke the tail light!" Katrina said, stunned.
"I know. But I don’t think anyone else saw. So, since you and the Priest aren’t gonna help me, the least you can do is not tell anyone," Jaye said, getting in her car and driving away as quickly and innocently as possible, setting the stupid lion back on her stupid dashboard.
*****
Jaye stopped home just long enough to grab some stuff, and headed back to her parents' house, bag over her shoulder and a pillow under her arm.
"There you are, sweetheart," Darren greeted her. "Did your brother find you?"
"No, but he’ll find me when he comes home. I’m sleeping here tonight. Or trying to, anyway. You didn’t redecorate my room with zoo-themed wallpaper, did y-" And then it clicked. "Why are you all dressed up?"
"We’re going to church," Sharon said, not sounding thrilled about it.
"Is it Christmas?" It could be! Time was different between here and Fandom! It was winter months! "Because if it is it snuck up on me and nobody’s getting anything."
"It doesn’t have to be Christmas for the Tylers to go to church," Darren answered.
"Is it Easter? Is it even Sunday?"
"Your mother and I are tickled to death that you’ve turned to the Lord for guidance, sweetheart," he said. "We just think it should be our Lord."
This day was just great. "Is this an intervention?" Jaye asked. "Because you know I’m too poor to buy illicit substances."
"Sometimes, if used incorrectly, God can be an illicit substance," Karen said wisely. "Catholics aren’t bad people. They just do things differently. Their prayers have to go through saints, and apostles and statues."
"Presbyterian prayers go straight to the source, good ol’ J.C.," Darren agreed.
Sharon shrugged. "Maybe Jaye should take her 8th grade Confirmation classes again. There were so many she missed the first go around."
Jaye shot Sharon a Look. "I didn’t do anything wrong. I shouldn’t have to go to church."
"That argument has never worked for you, sweetheart. It’s never worked for any of us," Darren insisted. "Now put the pillow in your room and let’s go worship."
"Fine," Jaye sighed, grabbing her pillow and stomping off… to the front door. Then out the front door. Then to her car. Which she started. Which she drove back to the trailer.
At least here things were normal. Sure, "normal" meant a bunch of animals no one else could hear were going to sing at her all night, but at least she didn't have to hear anything about religion anymore. She was just going to get in pajamas, maybe do something pointless on the internet, and-
"Oh good god!"
She had not been expecting Katrina to be sitting on her bed, among the animals, when she turned on the light.
"I’m sorry I called you a liar," Katrina told her. "You’re not a liar, Jaye. You’re a child of God."
This day was a roller coaster. "I am? You believe in God now? I brought you back to Him? Big H?"
"You most certainly did," Katrina said, getting up to walk over to her.
And then a second later Katrina was grabbing her in some kind of weird wrestling hold and covering her mouth with a washcloth. Jaye struggled, but for a little woman this grip was strong, and hey, what did chloroform smell like…?
When Jaye came to, she was on her bed, surrounded by more candles than she owned set up all around her. She tried to move, but her arms and legs were tied to the bed with rope in a decidedly not fun way.
"Don’t you worry, Jaye," Katrina said, pulling on a pair of leather gloves. "I know what I’m doing. Aaron told me how these work. If we have to, we’ll cut the Devil out of you."
Jaye barely had time to think about how much she was going to kill her brother, because Katrina was already sprinkling holy water on her with one hand while holding notes with another. "I exorcise thee, every unclean spirit, in the name of God the Father Almighty-"
"Katrina, untie me. Untie me now!" Jaye cried.
"I can’t. You’ll be flailing soon," Katrina said, matter-of-fact.
She'd wanted this so badly earlier and now nope, nope, didn't want it, take it back. "I don’t want to flail. I don’t want you to do whatever it is you’re going to do to make me flail."
"That’s the demon talking. Jaye wanted this," Katrina reminded herself, and then leaned to shout into Jaye's face. "Jaye, can you hear me?! Be strong, Jaye! Be strong! It’ll be gone soon!"
"Jaye doesn’t want this!" Jaye shouted back. "I don’t want this! I changed my mind!"
"Out, demon!" Katrina said, flicking more holy water on her. "Tu autem effugare, diabole!"
Jaye yelled for help, and Katrina stopped to shove a towel into her mouth to muffle the sound. She then put down the holy water to trade it for a bottle of baby oil, referencing her notes before putting it on her fingers, dabbing it on Jaye's forehead, shoulders and chest in the shape of the cross. "I anoint thee with the oil of salvation, that thou mayest have life everlasting."
After a moment of struggling, Jaye spit the towel out. "I should’ve listened to my mother. She told me you people were crazy."
"Do you believe in the Holy Spirit?" Katrina asked, picking up a knife.
Oh. Oh no. "What are you gonna do with that knife?" Jaye asked in a very small voice.
"Do you believe in the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of Saints, and the remission of sins? Do you believe in the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting?"
"No! Yes!" Jaye answered, panicked. "Can you repeat the second part?"
Katrina raised the knife. "Heavenly Father, guide my hand. Help me please you. Show yourself to me."
"The Holy water was working! More holy water!" Jaye cried. "Please! I could feel the demon leaving. No knife! More holy water."
Katrina actually looked relieved to be able to set the knife down and pick up the holy water again to throw more on her. "Keep fighting, Jaye! I’m here for you!"
This chick was just crazy with the holy water. Jaye kept having to turn her face to avoid getting shot in the eye with it as Katrina prayed, part in English and part in Latin and all in crazy, and Jaye was trying to figure out what happened once she ran out of holy water.
And then Katrina picked up the knife again.
"The demon’s gone, Katrina. It worked, you did it, it’s gone!" Jaye said.
"You’re lying. The demon is lying," Katrina said, but she did seem to be really nervous. "Please, Lord, give me strength. Talk to me. Tell me what to do."
"Here’s what to do! Put down the knife," Jaye begged. "Untie me and put down the knife."
"No. It’s the Devil inside you. And God wants me to get rid of it. And you...you wanted this," Katrina pointed out. "You asked for it."
"No I didn’t! Okay, I did," she conceded. "But I didn’t know it would be like this! Please. The voices, the animals, I was just mad at them. But they aren’t demonic, it just feels that way sometimes when they’re making me help people. Katrina, please, Please! Look at what you’re doing!"
At that, Katrina blinked, and looked at the knife in her hand, and Jaye, tied up and half-soaked… "I'm just trying to get God's attention."
Jaye was ready to argue, but there was a loud bang at the door, followed by another, and Katrina had lifted the knife again.
"Jaye Tyler? Open up. Police," came the voice at the door.
Katrina clamped a hand over Jaye's mouth before she could scream.
"We have a security video of your vehicle leaving the scene of an accident earlier today." The cop paused. "Miss Tyler, we know you’re home. We can see you."
Oh thank god. Jaye chomped down on Katrina's hand. Katrina screamed, just in time for the police to bust down the door, guns drawn. "Drop your weapon!"
Katrina did, and realized this had to be a shock for them. "It's not what it looks like."
*****
And so Jaye was finishing her night up at the police station. Not the first time she'd been here, probably wouldn't be the last. She had to give a statement, then waited on an uncomfortable bench while she waited for Katrina to finish telling her story to a cop. Mostly she was bored and wanted to go home, but she didn't want to deal with animals or getting changing holy watered bedding, and she couldn't go to her parents', so maybe she called Mahandra after this.
She was distracted from that line of thought by Father Scofield coming out of one of the other rooms, looking shaken. Jaye bounced to her feet and said, "Oh my god, they called you?"
"Excuse me?" he asked, distracted.
"I thought for sure you’d left town already."
"I was…"
"Well don’t worry. I’m not pressing charges," Jaye assured him. "She was just confused. Plus I did kinda encourage her to do it. You were right, by the way. Exorcism? A very, very bad idea."
He blinked at her. "I have a child I didn’t know about."
Jaye blinked back. "Come again?"
They released Katrina from statement-giving, and she looked completely ashamed when she joined them. "Father? I'm so sorry. I should have listened to you."
Father Scofield still looked completely shell-shocked. "It's a girl."
Katrina frowned. "Huh?"
"He’s got a kid he didn’t know about," Jaye said, like it was old news and not something she'd just learned like a second ago.
"But... how?"
"In the usual way.I wasn’t always a priest," Father Scofield explained. "My life before was... there was a woman… But I had no idea... she was on the pill. I guess she’s been looking for me all this time... they pulled me over for a broken tail light… when they ran my name… I’m a dead-beat dad."
Katrina took that in, and slowly glanced towards Jaye. "Broken tail light?"
He didn't answer, looking past them. Jaye turned and saw a woman in her thirties or so coming out of the restroom, still holding the door open as he breathed, "Marta…" and went to meet her.
Jaye could only hear part of the conversation, and believe her, she was trying. It was awkward, and she heard the word "sorry" a lot, and there was a little shock from Marta about the collar. And then from the open door came a little girl, a spitting-image of Marta, who wrapped a little arm around her leg. Father Scofield knelt in front of her, talked to her a little.
For as cynical as Jaye was, she actually felt pretty good watching this. It was a terrible day, she had a lot of stuff to fix… but this was good. "Bring her back to him," she said. "Wow."
Next to her, Katrina whispered, "It's a miracle."
[NFB, NFI, uhhh content warning for attempted exorcism? Taken from Wonderfalls 1x03, Wound-up Penguin.]
